Homeward Bound

by Emily Matchar (Simon & Schuster)

This exploration of what Matchar calls the “New Domesticity” follows college-educated, middle-class American women who have rejected cities, consumerism, and corporate culture in favor of very old-fashioned house- and family-keeping. They grow their own vegetables, knit their own clothes, and homeschool their children. Some run their own farms. All believe their return to the domestic sphere to be empowering. Matchar persuasively identifies causes of the trend, among them the paucity of labor laws and social services to support new parents, entrenched gender inequality in the workplace, and widespread fear about the quality of the food supply. She also points out the contradictions in these modern homesteaders’ ideology. Noting that the majority of her subjects are married and have outside sources of financial support, she argues that their retreat from the workforce could further disadvantage women who must by necessity remain. “The workplace is here to stay,” she writes. “Either women are going to be fully in it or they’re not.” ♦

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